Bradshaw Mountain baseball team wins Grand Canyon Region Championship
PRESCOTT VALLEY, Ariz. — Loaded with talent at every position and up and down the lineup, the varsity baseball team at Bradshaw Mountain made history in 2022, earning a school-record 16-2 record in power-point games while going 11-1 in its section to clinch a Grand Canyon Region Championship.
The season got off to a hot start for the Bears as they earned a seventh-inning comeback win over Apollo High School to open the season and then followed the performance by decimating the defending 6A State Champion Liberty Lions with a 14-4 run-rule victory.
After going 2-2 in the aforementioned season-opening tournament, Bradshaw was set to open the regular season at home and kicked it off in rockin’ fashion as senior pitcher/outfielder Sam Brown (led the team in homers in 2022 with seven) played the national anthem on electric guitar at the Bears’ first home game, a 19-6 win over Barry Goldwater that featured a walk-off grand-slam homer for the run rule off the bat of Vincent Magdaleno.
After cruising to two more wins, Bradshaw welcomed Flagstaff and Peoria to Prescott Valley and prevailed in both games with close wins. Against Flagstaff, Brown and Magdaleno combined to toss a gem while junior shortstop Dalton Irwin’s two-run double in the third inning proved to be the game-winner.
Against Peoria, the Bears fought back from a 3-0 deficit to tie the game and send things to extra innings in a game where junior pitcher Nate Ramirez and senior utility man Ryan Buckle combined to toss another gem. In extras, Irwin collected the walk-off single in the bottom of the eighth to push Bradshaw’s power-point record to 5-0.
After a rough spring-break tournament in which the Bears went 1-3, Bradshaw got back to business in its power-point games and started to dominate its region.
Led by senior catcher Vance Sartor’s six hits (led the team in hits in 2022 with 38 while slashing .452), Bradshaw bashed Lee Williams 17-3 and 15-6, before defeating Flagstaff on the road to complete that sweep.
At 8-0, Bradshaw squared off with the Coconino Panthers in Prescott Valley in a legendary game that started with a leadoff homer from junior third baseman Wes Collier and ended with a walk-off double off the bat of junior first baseman Elias Avila in the 10th inning.
After the dramatic victory, Bradshaw defeated Thunderbird, before dropping its only two power-point contests of the year to Coconino and Saguaro to push its record to 10-2.
With six games left to go, senior second baseman Ryan Buckle, senior DH Aiden Ott and sophomore centerfielder Shane Lievsay continued their impressive seasons along with the emergence of junior utility man Thomas McLaughlin as the Bradshaw ace to sweep Mohave and Mingus before dominating the rival Prescott Badgers to clinch the region championship and 16-2 power-point record.
Following the stellar regular season, the Bears earned the eighth seed in the playoffs and were eventually eliminated by the Saguaro Sabercats to bring their season to a close.
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